


Comings, Goings

by Kanekalon



Series: Telanadas (Nothing is inevitable) [2]
Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-13
Updated: 2019-07-13
Packaged: 2020-06-27 09:26:56
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 790
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19788022
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kanekalon/pseuds/Kanekalon
Summary: Early on in Haven, Nadasa Lavellan weighs her options.





	Comings, Goings

Nadasa watched a nug scurry across the ice and into the snowy hills. At night, Haven welcomed a frightening sort of cold whose threat whistled in on the wind. She sighed. It was _so_ cold up here. The air was so _thin_ up here. She couldn’t smell the ocean up here. The frozen ponds at the edge of the Inquisition’s outpost offered her nothing in resemblance to the pregnant echo of the Waking Sea, but if she tried hard enough, they offered her something like its solace.

She tucked herself deeper into her warm furs. Elves had given them to her – not Dalish. She thought she might be the only Dalish in Haven, but these elves came to her door in a small group, including the one she’d seen on awakening in her cabin. They were all bare-faced, but friendly and bearing gifts: A cloak stitched of various pelts, a soft pair of leggings, and a new name. 

_Peace, Shartanis._ One of the elves had said. _We’re glad to see you up._

Nadasa hadn’t argued with them as she took the cloak and leggings. _I plan on staying that way,_ she’d said.

She’d planned on leaving. She could. She could steal away in the night, in the dead of deep freeze, easy. She could get out of Haven and find her way to the coast. No one here could stop her. It occurred to her that she might cut off her hand and leave it for the Inquisition; just because she wanted to leave didn’t mean she’d condemn the world. Her people lived in it, too.

“You don’t think cutting it off would work,” she said aloud. There was a chuckle behind her. “Do you? My hand.”

“No.” Solas appeared from the shadows and stood next to her on the dock. Didn’t sit. It was little things like that which made Nadasa distrust him. “I think we’re all better off with the Mark where it is, for now.” He gave her a small smile, which she didn’t return. “I’m sorry that sainthood disagrees with you, Herald. Shartanis.”

She bared her teeth; he was mocking her, no matter how gently he spoke. He had a voice that could soothe fury, and he knew it. “Leave me alone.”

“So that you might slip away?” Now he sat next to her. He was so pale that moonlight suited him, glowing off the top of his shorn head. He sat close to her, like her clansmen would. But he wasn’t – didn’t look like one or smell like one, certainly didn’t speak like one. His accent didn’t settle - it danced.

“You can’t stop me from slipping away,” she said lightly, meeting his eye. He might have been tall and unwilling to share just how he knew all that he knew, but she thought she could take him in a fight.

“You’re certain.” He said. Didn’t ask. Nadasa pulled her furs tighter.

“Quite certain. But I’m not leaving.” So there it was then, in a puff of steam through cold lips. No one could stop her from leaving Haven, but between these mountains and the sea were many unknown miles in which the Templars, or _someone_ , could run her down. She had no halla and no knowledge of the Ferelden clans. There were hundreds of angry shemlen killing each other between here and the ship that might take her home, and she wasn’t in the shape she’d been in on the way to the Conclave.

And most importantly, the elf beside her was the only one who could help her if the Mark…changed.

She could leave, or she could be smart. 

Solas nudged her; when she frowned at the familiar gesture he just smiled. “I’m glad to hear it. My expertise is Fade, dreams, spirits. In combat, you might just send me to them permanently. And then,” he shrugged, “woe to the world.” He chuckled to himself as he stood up in one graceful movement, extending his hand back down to her. “Let me walk you back, Nadasa. It’s bitter cold and you still need rest.”

Nadasa knocked his hand away gently, like she might do to one of her clansmen, which he was not. “I’ll stay awhile.”

Solas inclined his head. “I’ll hold you to it.”

Never mind that those words sounded as menacing as they did hopeful. His meanings danced as insistently as his funny accent. But he did leave her alone.

Nadas sighed again and counted a handful of stars. She could sit here all night and look at the sky, avoiding the Breach despite feeling it on the back of her neck. Might as well. She didn’t like sleeping in the shem cabins and after a while, the cold simply numbed. 


End file.
